{"id":10208,"date":"2019-06-05T18:00:20","date_gmt":"2019-06-05T16:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/?p=10208"},"modified":"2019-06-06T22:15:13","modified_gmt":"2019-06-06T20:15:13","slug":"english-1968-1973-when-fiat-wanted-to-eat-citroen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/?p=10208","title":{"rendered":"ENGLISH – 1968-1973: when Fiat wanted to eat… Citro\u00ebn!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Fiat and Renault married ? This is not the first time that the Italian giant has taken an interest in French car manufacturers. In 1968, Fiat opened the door to Citro\u00ebn before wanting to take over in 1973 ! There is no question of playing the Cassandras here with regard to what is being established between Renault and Fiat, it is simply a reminder of a part of French automotive history.<\/p>\n

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\nPierre Bercot, then President of Citro\u00ebn<\/p>\n

For Citro\u00ebn, 1968 was the year of the company’s restructuring. The company previously known as “Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Anonyme Andr\u00e9 Citro\u00ebn” became “Citro\u00ebn S.A.” and included Citro\u00ebn cars, as well as Berliet and Panhard.\u00a0Pierre Bercot, the boss at the time, wanted to bring the structure of his company closer to that of Peugeot.\u00a0“From the first days of 1968”<\/em> writes Lucien Robin in his memoirs (Lucien Robin is an engineer who spent nearly forty years of his life at Citro\u00ebn, from 1937 to 1974)\u00a0“Pierre Bercot summoned Jalady and asked him if he felt he could carry out a restructuring of the Citro\u00ebn Companies on the Peugeot model before June 1. This was possible, but it was not necessary to waste time.” <\/em>Pierre Bercot gave the green light and associated Mr. Geoffroy, a finance and tax specialist, with the operation.\u00a0“In order not to create new companies, the public limited company Andr\u00e9 Citro\u00ebn was robbed. On the one hand, his factories and industrial fund were taken away from him in favour of a group company, the SPA. On the other hand, it will be extracted its commercialized subsidiaries and direct sales branches, for the benefit of another company in the group: Etoile du Nord.\u00a0\u00bb<\/em><\/p>\n

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\nClaude-Alain Sarre<\/p>\n

Thus, the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Anonyme Andr\u00e9 Citro\u00ebn became Citro\u00ebn S.A., the factories switched to the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Anonyme des Automobiles Citro\u00ebn and the Etoile du Nord became the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Commerciale Citro\u00ebn. “For Citro\u00ebn, it was an opportunity to set up a staff of young men, which constituted a huge revolution.\u00a0”\u00a0<\/em>New directors were then appointed to the management positions of these various Citro\u00ebn companies. Pierre Bercot obviously remained at the head of Citro\u00ebn S.A. while Citro\u00ebn Automobiles and Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 Commerciale Citro\u00ebn were managed by George Depre, Pierre Ingueneau, Fran\u00e7ois Michelin and Claude Alain Sarre. It was the latter who was appointed president of the two companies with Messiers, Ravenel and Fleury at his side.<\/p>\n

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Lattay’s drawing concerning the development of a sports coup\u00e9 at Citro\u00ebn that will give birth to the SM<\/p>\n

Everything was in place to revitalize the company in a period of crisis. A crisis that does not prevent Pierre Bercot from seeing ever further. First of all, it is the signing of an agreement with Maserati.\u00a0“Since 1968”<\/em> recalls Lucien Robin, “Citro\u00ebn announced an agreement with Maserati, the Italian manufacturer from Modena, and this time announced at the same time the probability of a forthcoming acquisition of a stake. This officially confirmed the intention to launch a top-of-the-range Citro\u00ebn model equipped with an engine manufactured by Maserati.\u00a0“<\/em>After Panhard and Berliet, Maserati joined Citro\u00ebn.<\/p>\n

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The agreement with Maserati (now a FCA brand!!!) gave birth to the V6 of the Citro\u00ebn SM GT coupe in 1970<\/p>\n

But that’s not all, little. Then it was the announcement of the alliance with Fiat, whereas Pierre Bercot had demonstrated that it was not feasible!\u00a0“It was enough in Bercot’s way of brilliantly exposing all the impossibilities of doing something and finally… doing it !\u00a0”\u00a0<\/em>writes Robin.\u00a0“All the other alliances, including the one with Peugeot that ended in 1966, had been welcomed by the staff with serenity and even a certain pride. The overriding feeling this time was worry, because the partner was much more powerful than us. The Agnellis, who spoke a lot, had never held Citro\u00ebn in high esteem. One of them even put us on the list of manufacturers who were to disappear, at a time when our success was undeniable.\u00a0\u00bb<\/em><\/p>\n

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Agnelli abandoned the idea of taking over Citro\u00ebn in 1973.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, it was with Fiat that the project for a small urban car and the beginnings of common commercial vehicles began. The case lasted until 1973, when the Agnelli wanted to take over Citro\u00ebn and the government stopped the discussions. This did not prevent Citro\u00ebn from going bankrupt and, to see the same government, push Peugeot to buy back the company born in 1919. This was the beginning of a completely different story with the formation of the PSA group in 1976.<\/p>\n

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Fiat and Renault married ? This is not the first time that the Italian giant has taken an interest in French car manufacturers. In 1968, Fiat opened the door to Citro\u00ebn before wanting to take over in 1973 ! There is no question of playing the Cassandras here with regard […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10208"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10208"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10211,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10208\/revisions\/10211"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lignesauto.fr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}